Stranded
by thecivilunrest
Summary: In the end love always wins. Simon/Isabelle


**Disclaimer: I don't own anything, all characters are Cassandra Clare's and not my own. **

**A/N: I **_**love **_**these two, and I have no idea if they'll ever become canon or what, even though they were for a while, but I had to write something for them and here it is. Aren't you guys so glad I found a new fandom to play around in? (I've always wanted to write a fic based on this song anyway, because I absolutely love it.) **

_Stranded_

I'm too afraid to show

If it's coming you

Like it's coming over me

Crashing like a tidal wave

That drags me out to sea

I want to be with you if you want to be with me

Crashing like a tidal wave that drags me out to sea

And I don't want to be

Stranded

- "Stranded" by Plumb

Their limbs were a tangled mass on the bed, both covered with jeans and cotton. They hadn't even bothered to to take off their shoes. Isabelle would have been content to lay there forever and listen to him breathe, even if it was mostly out of habit, and not to hear the beating of his heart.

Simon was playing with her hair and they weren't talking. They didn't always have to talk anymore, and Isabelle had to admit that she was just fine with that. Sure witty banter and bickering was fun, but eventually it just got exhausting.

They were both now at the point in a relationship when some of the time words were insignificant and the only thing that you really needed was the reassurance was the fact that the other person was in the same room and in close proximity.

Isabelle had never thought that she could get to that point, that she'd ever be so comfortable with someone that she'd be able to do the things that she did with Simon. It was a good feeling to know that she really and truly loved him, more than she had ever loved anything or anyone ever.

Then she felt Simon's chest tighten and he inhaled and exhaled deeply, unlike his shallow breathing beforehand.

"Look, Isabelle," Simon started, shattering the quiet that they had built. She could tell that he wasn't comfortable anymore and she lifted up her head to look at his face. He wasn't looking at her, instead his gaze was focused on one of the posters on his dorm room wall. "I don't really know how to do this, because I've never done this sort of thing before, but I just don't think that it's going to work between us anymore."

Isabelle righted herself so that she could look at Simon properly. Her head was spinning. He obviously didn't know what he was saying, not really. Of course not. She would have seen this coming, she would have known something was up.

Her mind raced trying to think of what it could have been to make him say that, but there wasn't anything that she could conjure up to make him want to break up with her. It couldn't be that he didn't want her anymore, _of course not_.

Just the day before had had told her that he loved her more than anyone else could love her. So why this? Why now? It didn't make any sense.

And besides. People _never ever _broke up with _her. _She was _Isabelle Lightwood. _

"What? Why are you saying that?" Isabelle Lightwood had always told herself that no boy would ever make her cry, that she would never cry because of a boy, and she wasn't crying. There were tears in her eyes, but she was blinking them away before Simon could see them, and that _didn't _count at all.

Suddenly she wanted to get as far away from his as possible. She scooted over until she was almost hanging off the bed, but she didn't get off just in case she could get him back.

"We knew this wasn't going to work eventually Izzy," he said softly. "Come on, you didn't actually think that this was going to go on forever did you? People are already looking at us strangely, because they think that I'm sixteen and you're twenty-one."

Isabelle paused, because she hadn't been sure what his argument was going to be, but she hadn't expected it to be that one. She hadn't noticed of course, because she had been with him and really what was the point of looking around when she was with him? Other people, especially mundies, didn't matter to her.

"You aren't going to want to grow old with someone who still uses Star Wars sheets," he said, probably trying to convince her more. Well she wasn't going to have it.

Isabelle clenched those said sheets, which were, incidentally, on his bed and said, "Well fine. Turn me into one of you."

Isabelle said this with conviction, because she really did mean it. She understood where he was coming from now, and there was a solution to this problem that didn't involve therapy. Sure, he was a Downworlder, but she could become one too.

Simon let out a bitter laugh. "You don't mean that. You're a Nephilim. You'd hate me forever if I did that, and you could hate me forever too. Plus you're family? Not so much. I know they're trying to be open and everything, but they've looked down on me and my kind since the beginning of time. Do you really think that they'd want their daughter to be one of the eternally damned? Not really."

"Well fine. I guess you really don't want to be with me then?" she asked, looking as fierce and grim as an Amazon warrior. Simon had no idea that when she got home she was going to lock herself in her room and cry for two days before finally emerging the child that their parents always wanted.

She expected Simon to protest, to tell her that it wasn't true at all and that he hadn't meant it and that he was just being an idiot but he didn't. Instead he just shook his head and didn't answer.

Isabelle walked out the door and didn't look back.

oOo

After Simon Isabelle became the daughter that her parents always wanted, the perfect sort of Nephilim girl, just like her mother was. Though her cooking skills never got any better, she became more obedient, at least about men, and she fought demons more fiercely than ever before.

Isabelle afterwards felt as though she had just become a shadow of the girl that she once was. She feels as though he left her stranded in the middle of the ocean and there's no way out of the current.

She had never thought that love could affect her so much. She had thought that _she _manipulated it, that she had defeated it, that she had commanded that very emotion. But she was wrong, of course.

In the end love always wins.

oOo

It was her wedding day. Everything was absolutely beautiful, as it often is at Shadowhunter weddings and everyone was in their traditional clothes.

Isabelle, far from a blushing bride, was the most beautiful person there and everyone knew it. Her dark hair looked even darker thanks to the clothes that she was wearing and her smile was as big as anyone had ever seen it.

No one would have known that a bit of her was mourning that day, but she quickly got over that feeling and tried to remind herself that there was more than one reason that she was marrying Daniel, which had always been the proper Nephilim boy that her parents had always hoped that she would decide on after all, after her rebellious phase was over and done with.

She had been dancing with Daniel when it happened. They had been twirling about in the reception hall (Which, according to Clary, was what mundane's did when they had weddings, and Isabelle wanted an after party. Her rebellious streak was not all gone.) and Isabelle had been laughing at Magnus, who had said something hilarious about one of the guests that Isabelle hadn't wanted to invite anyway.

It was just like a scene in one of Clary's mundane fairy tale books. She saw a pale hand place itself on Magnus's shoulder and she heard a voice ask "Can I cut in?"

She and Magnus both pause and Isabelle looks over Magnus's shoulder to see Simon, not looking any different than the day that she last saw him except he was in a suit and a tie.

Magnus, being the wise warlock that he was, decided to get out of the way and leave these two to themselves. He knew what had occurred between them, thanks to Alec, and decided it would be best if he left them alone.

A part of her wanted to tell him no, that he can't cut in, and to continue dancing with Magnus, but a larger part of her, the part that wins, almost squeals in delight and goes to hug him. He smells the same way that he always did and he hugs her back tightly. She hasn't seen him in four years and she certainly hadn't expected to see him here.

"You look beautiful," Simon says in her ear. All day people have been telling her that, but to hear Simon made it seem more permanent, more true. "Congratulations."

For some reason that word, those fifteen letters, cut Isabelle more deeply than anything that he could have said to her. That word is a reminder of what could of been, what wasn't, and what is now.

She leaned back, still holding on to Simon and said, "Thank you," not even noticing that tears were streaming down her face. Simon, however noticed them, and took a dirty hankerchief (_When had he started carrying a hankerchief? _Isabelle thought to herself.) out of his pocket and offered it to her.

Isabelle laughed slightly when she realized what she was doing and she took the hankerchief and dabbed her eyes. She then handed it back to him. "I'll never wash this again now that I've got the tears of an angel," Simon said, and she laughed again. Some things never changed.

"It already looks like it hasn't been washed in a while," she replied, and watched in euphoria as he smiled at her.

"You're right," he admitted. "It hasn't been."

Isabelle looked at him expectantly with her hands on her hips. When he noticed he asked, "What?"

"Well? Aren't you going to ask me to dance? That's what you came for, isn't it?"

"May I have this dance fair lady?" Simon bowed, acting ridiculous, but Isabelle couldn't totally hide her smile.

"Why of course good sir." Primly Isabelle held out her hand and Simon took it just as the next song started and he twirled her slowly.

"And to answer your question, no that isn't why I came. Well, not the whole reason anyway. I actually came because I wanted to see you one last time, even if you now belong to someone else."

"I'll never belong to someone else," Isabelle said a bit more sharply than was necessary. "I'll only ever belong to myself."

"Of course. I had forgotten who I was talking to." He pulled her tighter then and Isabelle had the sudden urge to put her head on his shoulder. This would have looked frightfully inappropriate, though, and she knew it.

For a moment Isabelle wanted to be alone with him, she wanted to kiss him, she wanted to go back in time, back in time when he was just a boy and she was just a girl. She probably wouldn't have let him get turned into a rat then.

But she knew she shouldn't be thinking these things,because she was getting married today to a man that was very much _not Simon_. Daniel isn't sarcastic or funny and he's not nearly as handsome as Simon is and will forever be.

"I've missed you so much," she whispers so that none of the wedding guests will hear. They have no idea who he is even though he looks so out of place that they know that he certainly isn't a Nephilim.

"I've missed you too. I'm sorry for everything, but you know it was for the best. You could never have had this," Simon waves his hand around at the decorations and the festivities that are all around the two of them, "with me."

"I could have, if you had let me, if you hadn't have decided my future for me."

"No, we couldn't have," Simon says this so firmly that for a moment it brings Isabelle up short. "Be lucky and happy that you're human. I miss it still, sometimes. It really sucks sometimes when the bars won't let you in because you look like you're sixteen."

Isabelle knows that he's just saying the last part to detract from their conversation, an old and well used Simon move, so she ignores his last words with a roll of her dark eyes. "You made your choices and I made mine."

"And now here we are, both of us at your wedding and you looking like the most beautiful women in the world and me still looking like the teenage nerd that I will forever be."

"You weren't a nerd."

Simon just looked at her. "Okay," she admitted, "You were always a nerd. But it was cute."

"And you were always beautiful."

She can see Daniel now and he's looking at the two of them quizzically. He looks as if he's going to start walking over to the two of them and he does. Isabelle realizes that they probably had been together than far longer than was proper, but did anyone blame her for wanting to keep him with her forever?

He knows that they're about to part again to and so he whispers in her ear, "You'll always be the most beautiful girl in the world to me."

And then, like a puff of smoke, he's gone.

oOo

Daniel is dead. Even though Isabelle was raised as a warrior, raised to expect death at every turn it still hurts. It still makes her feel pain. She is a widow at the ripe age of thirty and even though she wasn't passionately in love with Daniel or anything of the sort she still will miss him.

He was a great husband, attentive and caring, and even though they never had a spark he had loved her and he was comfortable. But now he was dead.

Dead. Just like her father and just like Max. She wasn't able to save either of them.

That's what hurts the most, of course. Isabelle has always been a warrior and the worst part of fighting is the fact that you can't protect everyone the way that you want to.

She sits alone there at his pyre for hours until she finally decides to go to home. For a moment she thinks about how lucky she is that they never had children, because at least now she won't have to explain to anyone what happened to Daniel. They will all understand.

She pulls her coat tighter around herself and walks fast, her whip sitting very comfortably in its pocket.

"Isabelle," a voice calls behind her and she whips around. She knows that voice. She hasn't heard it in years, not since her wedding day, and she knows whose voice it is. She would always remember it, and for once she doesn't want to see the person that the voice belongs to.

"How dare you show your face here?" Isabelle asked him, looking fiercer than he has ever seen her. "Filthy Downworlder. It's your fault that he died."

And it is. It was Simon's kind that killed Daniel and she doesn't want to see another vampire for a long, long time. She hasn't seen Simon in years and he feels like _now _is the right time to come and visit? Does he expect some tea?

She sees the reaction that her words make and she sees the pain in his eyes. Well good. Now he knows what it feels like. Now he knows what it felt like when she had to walk away from him, what it felt like when he left her at her wedding. What if feels like now not to be with Daniel anymore.

"No, it's not my fault," Simon knows why she's saying this, and suddenly it strikes him how much _older _she looks. She isn't the girl that he fell in love with, but even with the grief and the years that have aged her, she is still as beautiful as the day that he first saw her.

"It's in the nature of your kind, isn't it, to drink blood? To be a parasite? To feed on others?" In that moment she never want to see him again. She is filled with anger and grief, and it feels _fantastic _to be letting some of that go. She hasn't cried yet, not once and nor is she planning to.

"And isn't it in the nature of _your _kind to be noble and fair?" Simon asked, and Isabelle blinked, getting caught up short.

She hugs herself tightly, trying to get warm, and doesn't reply. She has nothing to say to him, not now and not ever. She knows that what she said wasn't fair, it certainly wasn't noble, and it wasn't right to blame the actions of one rogue vampire on Simon.

"Yes," she answered, knowing that she was beaten.

Looking at Simon and how he seems more indestructible than her deceased husband, and how strange it is to be able to look at him and see the girl that she used to be right next to him, it just makes her want to cry.

And so she does. This is the first time that Simon has ever seen her cry out of grief, other than the time in the aftermath of her younger brother's death, and it frightens him a little. But he goes to comfort her afterwards, exactly like he did after Max's death.

At first she refuses to cry with him to comfort her, it feels so _wrong_, but then she remembers that this is _Simon _one of the only people that she loves and she lets herself go and sobs uncontrollably into his shoulder.

Simon, to his credit, lets her ruin his shirt with her snot and water and salt and he holds her tightly as though he's never going to let her go. They both know that eventually he's going to have to leave and that he's not going to be able to go to the Institute, but for once it's okay to just be holding each other.

"I need a distraction," she whispers against his shirt after she's done crying and he rubs her back, knowing that he'd be anything she needed.

oOo

He leaves her again that night, after all is said and done, and he knows that the next time that one of them leaves the other he's the one that is going to be left behind.

oOo

They bring her to a mundane hospital to die. Jace and Clary both know that there is no amount of magic, not even all of Magnus Bane's power, that can save her. She wants to die where _he _can find her, and Clary calls him as soon as she's able to.

He arrives even paler than usual and they say that Simon is related to her, that he's her brother and the nurses believe them even though the women on the hospital bed is nearly sixty and Simon is very obviously only in his teens.

She looks very tired and very old when he comes to see her. Her hair is now streaked with a bit of gray and there are lines on her face that weren't there when he saw her last.

He thinks of all of the times that he's seen her since she turned twenty years old, how he often checked up on her and she never knew, how he only saw her at pivotal times in her life because he knew that if he saw her more often than that he'd never be able to stay away.

She'll never know, now, how much he cared.

Isabelle opens her eyes when she relizes that he's in the room with her. He can tell that she thought that he was going to be someone else but when her eyes land on him the last of the life in her reaches her eyes and she grabs for his hand.

Even though he has no body heat he can tell how cold her hand is. "Hello," she says and he can tell that talking for her is difficult.

"Hey," he says, squeezing her hand.

She starts to say something else but her breathing is labored and he knows that she shouldn't be talking. It might make the wound on her chest worse. "It's okay," he whispers, letting her relax.

Isabelle is staring at his face, wanting to memorize every line and nook and cranny in it. She sees him doing the same to her and she wishes, for a moment, that she was young and beautiful again.

Being a vampire, sometimes Simon gets this feeling when he looks at someone and he knows that they're going to die soon. Simon is getting that feeling from Isabelle and even though he doesn't want to be getting that feeling from her he knows this is the reason that he let her go all those years ago.

Isabelle had been so full of life, so full of passion that it is unbelievable to him that he is slowly watching all of that leave from her. He would have thought that she would have been able to live forever on those two qualites alone. But no human can live forever.

"Just so you know," he starts, knowing that he isn't going to be able to speak to her again, knowing that soon her soul will leave her body and she will be burned into oblivion. She looks up at him, her dark eyes hungry for what he's going to say next. "There will never be another girl like you to me. Not ever."

He doesn't know how much hearing those words cross his lips makes her feel overjoyed, how his face being the last thing that she ever looks at brings her peace. He will never know that, and that's the part that hurts the most, for the both of them.

"Simon..." His name will be the last thing that she ever says. He just smiles at her, wishing that vampires could cry, and he places his hand on her face, feeling her pulse getting slower and slower with each second. She grabs the hand on her face and wishes that she never had to let go.

And then she leaves him forever just like he meant for her to do. He won't ever be able to go in and out of her life like a needle going through cloth again.

Now he's the one who's stranded.


End file.
